Page:Aelfric's Lives of Saints Vol 2.djvu/393

 Then the  heathen  prefect  bade  men  seize  Chrysanthus

and Daria  together  for  their  faith  in  the  Lord,

and commanded  men  to  punish  them  with  divers  torments  unto death,

if they  would  not  sacrifice  to  the  venerable  gods.

Chrysanthus was  delivered  to  seventy  soldiers,

and they  bound  him  very  harshly  indeed;

but the  bonds  burst  asunder  as  soon  as  he  was  bound.

They bound  him  again,  oft  and  repeatedly,

but the  bonds  slipped  off  so  quickly  from  him

that one  could  not  perceive  whether  they  had  been  knit.

Then the  soldiers  became  irate  against  the  Christian  youth,

and set  him  then  in  a  hard  stock,

and fastened  his  legs  in  the  fetters,

insulting with  words  the  holy  man;

but the  fetters  turned  wonderfully  to  rottenness  (?),

and all  to  dust  through  the  Lord's  might.

Then the  soldiers  supposed  that  he  knew  sorcery,

and drenched  him  all  over  with  old  urine,

thinking that  the  urine  might  frustrate

all his  magic;   but  they  toiled  in  vain;

because the  urine  through  God's  might

became straightway  turned  to  a  sweet  smell.

Then they  quickly  skinned  an  ox  in  their  fury,

and sewed  up  Chrysanthus  with  the  hide

next to  his  naked  body,  and  placed  him  facing  the  sun.

He lay  thus  all  day  in  the  overpowering  heat,

but the  hide  could  not  harden  about  him,

nor hurt  the  saint  in  the  liot  sun.

Then they  tied  his  neck  strongly  with  chains,

and his  hands  together  with  hard  iron,

and his  feet  together  with  cruel  intention,

and cast  him  so  bound  into  a  blind  prison.

Then the  bonds  on  his  neck  and  hands  slipped  asunder,

and there  shone  a  great  light,  as  if  of  many  lamps.

Then the  soldiers  made  that  known  to  Claudius  their  officer,